Geology and Mineralogy. 99 



" The experimental investigations which at first were designed 

 to procure analogies capable of explaining phenomena on the 

 earth, such as aurora and magnetic disturbances, were subse- 

 quently extended, as was only natural, with the object of procur- 

 ing information as to the conditions under which the emission of 

 the assumed helio-cathode rays from the sun might be supposed 

 to take place. The magnetic globe was then made the cathode 

 in the vacuum-box, and experiments were carried on under these 

 conditions for many years. It was in this way that there grad- 

 ually appeared experimental analogies to various cosmic phe- 

 nomena, such as zodiacal light, Saturn's rings, sun-spots and 

 spiral nebulae. The consequence was that attempts were made 

 to knit together all these new discoveries and hypotheses into one 

 cosmogonic theory, in which solar systems and the formation of 

 galactic systems are discussed perhaps rather more from electro- 

 magnetic points of view than from the theory of gravitation. 

 One of the most peculiar features of this cosmogony is that space 

 beyond the heavenly bodies is assumed to be filled with flying 

 atoms and corpuscles of all kinds in such density that the aggre- 

 gate mass of the heavenly bodies within a limited, very large 

 space would be only a very small fraction of the aggregate mass 

 of the flying atoms there. And we imagine that an average 

 equilibrium exists in infinite space, between disintegration of the 

 heavenly bodies on the one hand, and gathering and condensation 

 of flying corpuscles on the other." 



II. Geology and Mineralogy. 



1. Geology of Saratoga Springs and vicinity ; by H. P. 

 Cushing and R. Ruedemann. N. Y. State Mus., Bull. 169, 

 1914, pp. 1-177, pis. 1-20, text figs. 1-17, 1 map. — This report 

 treats in detail of the difficult geology of the region about the 

 widely known watering place, Saratoga Springs, New York. The 

 Adirondack complex basement and the slightly folded but much 

 faulted early Paleozoic strata of the western area are described 

 by Cushing; while the almost undisturbed shale series of the 

 western basin and the greatly overthrust and highly complicated 

 structure of the eastern trough are wrought out by Ruedemann. 

 How far the eastern mass of closed folds and isoclinal structure 

 overrides the western in "Schuppen" or shingle structure, is not 

 known, but the contained fossils in the two series of strata show 

 clearly that they are the sediments of two distinct water areas 

 separated from one another by a land barrier. Marked folding 

 took place toward the close of the Ordovician (Taconic revolu- 

 tion), but when the major thrust-faulting occurred is not as yet 

 known. It may have taken place during the closing periods of 

 the Paleozoic. c. s. 



